The North West High Court in South Africa on Thursday, May 26, sentenced a 24-year-old man to five life terms for rape and 300 years for other offences, which included housebreaking and robbery with aggravating circumstances.

Sbongiseni Njabulo Ngwenya was found guilty on 39 counts, of which 16 were rape, nine armed robbery, 13 housebreakings, and one attempted murder.

The court, sitting in the Ga-Rankuwa regional court, declared Ngwenya unfit to possess a firearm and ordered that his name be included in the register of sexual offenders.

Ngwenya made an application for leave to appeal, and his application will be heard on Friday.

Ngwenya was arrested in September 2018 after a series of crimes reported to the police.

Evidence presented in court revealed that Ngwenya broke into his victims’ homes at night, threatened them with a firearm, robbed them of TV sets, cellphones, and money, and raped them before fleeing the scene.

Three of his rape victims were minors aged 12, 14 and 16. Ngwenya was linked by DNA to the rape cases.

On the attempted murder charge, he accosted two girls as they entered their home. When their brother appeared from another room, Ngwenya shot him in the leg and took the girls to a nearby bush and raped them.

Ngwenya's conviction was praised by all those involved in securing it.

"The hopes of our people are pinned on the criminal justice system to fight gender-based violence, and such convictions will be a deterrent factor to wannabe offenders," Makhari-Sekhaolelo said.